Why Gaming?

I came across this banner that shows some statistics about gaming in the U.S.  Clearly this is more than a niche community.  With console gaming jumping into the online format, the online gaming community has grown rapidly.

Personally, I am a PC gamer and some of my games include World of Warcraft, Team Fortress 2, and Left 4 Dead 2.  You can catch more of my gaming habits here.

I have seen plenty of Twitter discussions using #hashTags and Podcasts that go further into specific games.  For example when World of Warcraft's latest expansion: Cataclysm was due for launch, Twitter was inundated with #cataclysm chatter.

The Gaming industry pulls in $10.5 billion in revenue.  However online gaming has a niche of it's own.  People want to play with others.  Subscription based games are very common.

 

3D Virtual Communities

I plan to research on how gaming and virtual communities thrive so well.  The easiest example is World of Warcraft.  With a subscriber base of over 12 million we will see how companionship formed in-game extends to the social media on the web.  There are thriving blogs such as WoW Insider that have thousands of members discussing all aspects of the game, thus creating a niche virtual community on the web.

Why gaming?

What kind of social media is utilized?

Blog Activity

This post constitutes as activity.  I already have two comments by very nice peers, Jen and Mitchell.  Thank you.

I discovered www.wordsquared.com --as if wordfeud on my Android wasn't enough.

Thats an aerial view of the most biggest scrabble board I have ever seen.

It was a chilly Saturday morning.  I saw the temperature drop as low as 29 degrees when I woke this morning around 6am.

Hoping it gets a little warmer throughout the day.  The sun is out quite bright at the moment.  I am packing up a few things and taking a drive down to San Jose for the weekend.

Have a great weekend all.

COMS 178

Course Description

This course explores the nature of communication in virtual communities on the Internet and the impact that these communities have on traditional communication media and lifelong learning. 

Topics include: the interaction of real and cyber communities, online self-publishing, educational uses of virtual communities, virtual self-governance, artificial intelligent agents, and the issues of security, privacy, and anonymity.   

Students will participate in structured online activities and take part in the development of their own virtual communities.